The Widow's Ferry

by Dorothy A. Bell

  Mrs. Reason clutched her husband’s arm. “We could stay here tonight. It looks treacherous. The ferry is nearly submerged. We’ll never make it across.”

  Mr. Reason patted her hand. “You keep a good hold on Isabell. Paxton will hold the team. I’ll give Barney a hand. You need to be in your own bed tonight. Besides, this might be our only chance to get across. If it starts to rain, my guess is we won’t be back over to our place for several days. We don’t want to get stuck on this side of the river. You sit tight. We’ll get across.”

  Anora scrambled down off the wagon and scurried up the bank to stand near the oxen. Mr. Hayes dismounted and followed her. “It looks like we’re in for a flood. Are you going to be all right here? You’ve got plenty of food…wood? I probably won’t be able to get back over for a few days. You could come home with us?”

  She couldn’t tear her gaze away from the water—eddies swirled with slush, tree branches tumbled in the current. She shuddered, the water screamed by, laughing at her, taunting her.

  The arm he laid across her shoulders didn’t help ease her fear. “You should be all right, but if the water gets up here, you go up to the barn? Anora…did you hear what I said?”

  She shifted away from his arm. Head down, she licked her cold lips, nodded, and hugged herself, to hold herself together.

  “Good. I’m glad you came with us today.”

  Her fingers digging into her arms, she made herself look him in the eyes; he mustn’t guess her weakness, her terror. Teeth chattering, forcing a smile, looking anywhere but in the direction of the river, she said, “Yes…yes…it’s been a good day. A better day than I’ve had in a long while, thank you.”

  “Paxton,” Mr. Reason called out from the wagon. “The ferry’s pulling in. We’re losing daylight.” Mr. Hayes waved and took the reins of his horse. He squeezed her arm before he skidded down the slippery bank, leading his mount.

  Anora watched them board. They waved. The ferry pulled away from shore, and she thought them doomed. The ferry could break loose from the cable, or a log, rolling down from upstream, could crash into the rickety raft and send them all to a watery, horrible, cold and merciless grave. Helpless, she waited for disaster to strike.

  Holding her breath, arms folded tight across her chest, she listened to the voice of the water gurgling, gulping, greedily whooshing and hissing. The cable sang overhead, growing tighter with the pull of the current. Her gaze drawn up into the bare branches of the oak where the cable choked the girth of the tree, she heard the snap and crack of bark being stripped away.

  The ferry, made of puncheon logs and split rails, slick with water, swung out into the current. She could make out Mr. Reason, he put his weight on the rudder to help the boy. After a few, long, tense moments, the craft sidled safely into the shore on the Takenah side. Mr. Reason waved to her—she imagined she could see his grin.

  Mr. Hayes led the mules and wagon, with Mrs. Reason and Isabel still on the board seat, off the ferry and up the track, away from the river. He took off his hat and waved to her before climbing up onto his horse. Furtively, looking toward the cabin, Anora hesitated to wave back, afraid. Even if Rueben wasn’t there today, he’d find out. He’d kill her or make her wish she were dead.

  Alone on the bank, she waited until the wagon had gone out of sight before unharnessing Roscoe and Pete. It started to rain, the rain coming down so hard rivulets of water cut down the track from the barn. She saw to the milking and feeding the chickens. Barely able to see the cabin, she made her way to the shelter of the stoop at the cabin.

  Before making a fire, she removed her wet clothes and wrapped herself in the comforter. The sound of the river never left her ears throughout the long night. Several times, she got up from her bed and opened the cabin door, to peer into the deluge. Everywhere she looked she saw the water reflecting back at her, making a lake of the yard. She didn’t want to think about the river, or the rising water, she wanted to think about the day, about running, laughing, and playing. But the river kept flooding her dreams, swamping any peace she might have had.

  »»•««

  Paxton wiped his hand across his face. “Phew.” He sat on the bench on the back porch to remove his high-top rubber boots. “It’s going to be a long night.”

  “If it rises much farther, it’ll be in town,” Hank said, sitting next to Paxton on the bench to remove his boots. “I wonder how Mrs. Talbot is faring.”

  “If she’s gone up to the barn, she’ll be fine. It’ll be a miracle if the cabin goes untouched.”

  “Does the river go out every year?”

  Paxton grinned at him and shrugged. “More or less, sometimes a couple of times a year, but it’s been a while since I’ve seen it come up this far this fast.”

  “The rain’s stopped,” Hank said, going to the rail of the porch, looking off to the northwest. “The sky looks a little pink tonight, maybe it’s clearing off.”

  “Hmm, yep, but there’ll be another day or so of rising water. Maybe the rest of the week, so we better be ready with those sand bags.”

  “Good thing you put your house on this end of town, away from the river,” Hank said, following Paxton into the kitchen.

  “It wasn’t planned. I just liked the view here.”

  Lydia laid the last plate on the table, straightened to rub the small of her back. Hank crossed the room to the stove and lifted the lid off the cast-iron pot to inhale the aroma of the savory contents. He opened the oven and there he found golden biscuits.

  “Would you take those out for me?” Lydia asked. “Everything’s done. I think I’ll go lie down.”

  “You go ahead. I’ll bring your supper up. Don’t worry about the dishes, or Isabell. You’re wearing yourself out.”

  “It doesn’t seem like I’m doing anything. I don’t know what’s making me so tired.” Hank helped her up the stairs.

  “Couldn’t be because you’re going to give birth in less than a month?” he said, his hand beneath her elbow as they came to the upstairs landing.

  “A month and a half,” Lydia said, opening the door to their room.

  “A month,” Hank corrected her.

  Paxton had followed them up the stairs. Hank looked over his shoulder and met his brother-in-law’s concerned gaze. Paxton stayed on the landing, still there when Hank came back out into the hall. “Is she going to be all right? Maybe she should have a doctor. I think I could get one to come down from Salem. Dr. Geary. I met him once, he delivered a foal for me.”

  “A horse doctor? Paxton?”

  “I liked him. It was an expensive foal, one of those purebreds, Morgan, I think. We should at least talk to Tamara Gregson. Everybody comes into the store sooner or later. She’ll know who’s good at helping out at a birthing.”

  “That would be a relief. Lydia doesn’t say so, but I know she’s scared of having the baby by herself. Your mother was there for her when Isabell was born. I think that’s part of the reason why she’s been so snappish lately.

  Paxton sent a look toward the stairwell. “Speaking of Isabell, I better find the little squirt. It’s mighty quiet around here. I wonder what she’s up to.”

  Hank nodded. “Right, I’ll get supper on the table.”

  He set the small oak table, the sound of rain falling on the roof of the back porch. He shook his head. He’d hoped the rain had stopped for the night. On second thought, he thought the flood a good thing. Ben Talbot’s return would be delayed for a few more days. Anora needed time to heal.

  Hank asked himself what he’d do when Ben returned. He couldn’t stand by and allow Anora to endure even one more minute of torture. And the thought of her spending a night in the man’s company filled him with such rage and foreboding, he could barely keep himself from screaming.

  Chapter Eleven

  On the front porch, Anora carefully strained the milk through the cheesecloth to separate the cream from the milk. A thin steam of milk trickled from the bottom of the bag into the milk can. A cool breez
e teased the errant tendrils of hair that had escaped the braid across her shoulder. The sun felt good on her back. She smiled to herself. The sleeves of her faded denim dress rolled up past her elbows, the top two buttons at her throat undone, she started to hum, something she hadn’t done in a very long time. He’d been gone a long time. She wanted to believe he’d left for good this time.

  The floodwater had come up to the first step of the cabin. She’d spent two nights in the barn. But now, after a couple days of good weather, everything had started to dry out. Everywhere you looked, there were signs of spring—new grass coming up out in the yard, trees beginning to bud, the pussy willows along the river were showing signs of bursting open.

  The gig came down the lane past the barn and pulled up before the porch. Stopping her work, Anora shaded her eyes with one hand, the other hand going to her hip.

  The carriage held her attention, very smart, not something you saw every day in this part of the world. A black leather bonnet over the cab protected the occupants from the weather, leather doors kept the mud and dust from the passengers. And the proud, glossy, high-stepping bay horse in harness sported blinders to preserve its high-strung nerves. The driver of the elegant equipage stepped down, turned to the fashionably dressed redhead inside the gig, putting his head down, and inside the door he said, “This won’t take long, Minna. I’d rather deal with her myself. I’m gonna apologize now for any violence or obscenities you might be subjected to.”

  Now clean-shaven, but for the long sideburns that came down both sides of his jaw, at first glance, Anora hadn’t recognized him. He’d lost at least twenty pounds. Dressed in his fine coat of black wool and matching trousers, a snowy white shirt with pearl buttons, a black bow tie, a black felt, bowler hat, and new, freshly polished, black knee-high leather boots, she couldn’t believe her eyes. His hands were clean, his eyes completely devoid of red, taking at least five years of debauchery from his face. Now the lines were sharper, finer somehow, the skin tightened under his chin and jaw. But his voice, the voice remained the same, a calculating purr accompanied the evil gleam lurking behind his smiling, black eyes.

  His gentlemanly demeanor, Anora recognized as a façade he projected for the benefit of the woman in the gig. The look he trained on her delivered the familiar heavy dose of loathing. The lines around his smiling mouth pursed into a mean scowl, his hard eyes narrowed to satanic slits, even the color of his skin faded from a healthy tan to a sallow gray beneath the shadow of his black hat when he turned his full attention to her.

  Ignoring her without speaking, he entered the cabin. Moving beyond the reach of the sunlight from the doorway, he cast his menacing aura about the room like a vile, putrid odor.

  Anora flattened herself against the cabin door, afraid to breathe, unable to take her eyes off him. He stood before her dresser, gazing down upon her sacred toilet set of comb, brush, and mirror. His fingers stroked the smooth, orange tortoiseshell of the mirror. He bent his head, turning his gaze upon her, an evil sneer on his lips, thick black brows arched. Anora shivered, imagining those fingers, cold and cruel, sliding around her throat.

  Malicious glee twitching at his lips, he picked up the mirror, then the brush and the comb, one thing at a time, examining each piece slowly, taunting her before placing them into his coat pocket.

  “You’re lookin’ good for a dead woman,” he said, his voice a dark whisper. In two strides he glided over to her, coming close enough for her to smell the tobacco on his breath when he spoke.

  He jerked his head toward the wooden table in the middle of the room, where his pocketknife remained jabbed into the heart of the table. Each day she forced herself to defiantly sit before that knife and eat her meals.

  “I see you still got my knife. I should’ve helped you get on with it, given you a little push. But I guess we’ll have to do this the hard way.” He shrugged his shoulders. “I don’t mind. Makes it all the more interestin’. Well, if you didn’t take the hint, then I reckon I’ll just take my knife back. You should’a done it yourself, Norie girl, but you always was stupid. Too stupid I guess to slit your own wrists. You won’t need to know how to do nothin’ now, not where you’re goin’. Old Ruben’s gonna give you all the help you need. I’ll get you started on your way to the sweet beyond this time. I’ll get you started real good.”

  He moved to the table, and with one hand pulled the knife out of the tabletop, flicked the blade back into the bone handle and stuffed it into his trouser pocket.

  Anora flinched, her breath catching in her throat, associating the tug of the knife blade from the wood, to her heart. He meant to kill her for certain this time.

  Unable to stop herself, she followed after him down the steps of the porch, stumbling along, her eyes trained on his coat pockets and the hidden toilet set. Standing behind him, she watched him hand first the comb, then the brush, and last, the mirror through the opened door of the gig to the woman inside.

  The titian-haired woman, dressed in emerald green from her head to her feet, her face painted with powder and rouge, oohed and awed over his offering. Anora didn’t think anyone’s eyelashes could naturally be that black or thick. The woman’s small gloved hands greedily reached out for the hair brush.

  “They ain’t much, but they were Mama’s,” he told the woman. “I wouldn’t want to leave them behind. She never used ’em anyhow, preferred a pine needle brush for her dirty mop.” He looked back at her, shook his head, giving her a pitying glance.

  “Everything else is unimportant. I looked around; there’s nothing else worth keepin’. We’re gonna have more, and better, once we get to California.”

  Anora, heart pumping wildly, watched the woman inspect the toilet set, turning each piece over in her small, green gloved hands. She held up the mirror to gaze upon her reflection and smiled, satisfied with what she saw.

  When she smiled tenderly at him, about to put the hairbrush to the curls at the side of her head, Anora at last found it in herself to react. With superhuman strength, she shoved him aside and grabbed the mirror out of the woman’s hand, snatching the comb and brush away with the other hand.

  Ruben fell to the ground. He came up on his elbows, an eager smirk on his face.

  Mine!” Anora heard herself scream, in a voice so full of power and blood, she didn’t recognize it. “My mother’s. My mother’s. You won’t put them to your dirty hair. Don’t.”

  Her voice a high-pitched screech, the woman retaliated. “You little slut. Those belong to Rudy’s dear mother.” Shoving the carriage door open, she reached out in an attempt to snatch back the mirror. Anora gave her a hard crack on her head with the hairbrush for her trouble, which knocked the woman’s fancy green bonnet to the floor of the conveyance.

  The woman brought her knee out of the carriage door, catching Anora in the abdomen, knocking the wind out of her for a second, but long enough for the woman to take back the mirror, and grab for the hairbrush.

  Anora, recovering sooner than the woman anticipated, came up suddenly, catching the woman on the chin with her head. The woman screamed. Blood oozed over her bottom lip from the bite she’d given herself. Succumbing to out and out blind rage, the woman grabbed a fist full of Anora’s hair and shoved her to the ground. Leaping out of the gig, she pounced on Anora with all her weight. Soon both of them were on the ground, rolling from side to side, screaming, scratching, and clawing at one another.

  Anora heard him laughing. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw his black boots shuffling aside to give them room to scuffle. Anora managed to straddle the kicking, biting woman.

  He reached down and pulled back hard, twisting one of her arms around until her fist was knotted up into her spine. With his other hand, he pulled the hair at the front of her head back until she was looking directly up into the sun. The woman, still doing combat, managed a couple of good blows to Anora’s right ear before he dragged her off to the side.

  The woman, hissing and snarling like a bobcat, scrambled to her feet. �
�Oh, oh, you little bitch. What’cha gonna do with her, Rudy? You hold her, and I’ll strangle her myself.”

  Her words, filtered through clenched teeth, swirled around Anora’s dusty, sweaty upturned face.

  All the while the woman fussed, huffing and puffing, making threats, she fumbled with her hair, dusting off her clothes.

  At her back, Ruben barked a laugh. “I think she could use a little dip in the river to cool off, don’t you, Minna? With any luck, she’ll drown.”

  The woman grinned, panting with rage, she said, “Drown the nasty little wart. Dumb piece of muck.” Shaking the dust off her skirts, she skipped alongside as Ruben dragged Anora toward the river.

  »»•««

  “Well, of course Mrs. Reason is afraid. What woman in her right mind wouldn’t be,” Tamara Gregson said, talking to Hank and Paxton inside the doorway of the mercantile. “I may not have any children of my own, but I know a thing or two about helping in their birthing. Does she know you two have come asking for help?”

  Hank shifted from one foot to the other. He heard Paxton grumble under his breath. But before they could defend themselves, Tamara saved them by saying, “Well, that’s all right. I’ll go around this afternoon and invite myself in for some tea. I’ll do my best to let her know I’ll be there to get her and the baby safely through delivery. It’s all a matter of soap and water, and Mother Nature will do the rest. Well, sometimes she needs a little help. Anyway, glad to, Mr. Reason, glad to help.”